23 historic photographs of classical composers doing incredibly normal things

12 July 2021, 13:39 | Updated: 12 July 2021, 15:12

Beethoven played on a Broadwood Piano

Iconic preserved moments of history’s most esteemed maestros, doing very normal stuff.

Photography is vital to our world. It gives us a deep connection to the past, preserving memories and moments of historic importance, and telling truths if ever sinister attempts are made to mask reality.

And as photography became increasingly widespread during the 19th century, classical composers began to enjoy their own moments under the flash-and-powder.

Now, from Gustav Mahler to Leonard Bernstein, we often hail these musicians’ art as so influential, so unrivalled, that we can forget they are just human beings like all the rest of us. Human beings, with really mundane hobbies outside of the recording studio.

Seeing is believing, as these great maestros show an interest in falconry, sledging and, well, swinging. Of the playground sort, mind you…

Read more: Chopin’s face is brought to life in artist’s incredible 3D portraits

1. Claude Debussy having a nap (1900)

   

2. Dmitri Shostakovich watching his favourite football team on a Sunday morning in Moscow (1942)

   

3. Dame Ethel Smyth waiting impatiently for women to have equal rights (1930)

   

4. Young Sergei Prokofiev playing an intense game of chess (date unknown)

   

5. Richard Strauss in Schierke, Germany, sledging with noticeable discomfort (date unknown)

   

6. John Williams dropping by to visit Luciano Pavarotti in his dressing room at the Grammy Awards (1999)

   

7. Leonard Bernstein swinging barefoot outside his Fairfield, Connecticut home (1986)

   

8. German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen smoking a pipe during a recording session (1970)

   

9. Austrian conductor Herbert von Karajan enjoying a spot of falconry (1955)

   

10. French composer and conductor Nadia Boulanger, exasperated during rehearsals (1976)

    

11. Opera legend Jessye Norman and film maestro John Williams share a moment (2012)

    

12. Gustav Mahler enjoying some family time with wife Alma, and daughters Anna and Maria (1910)

    

13. Italian opera composer Giuseppe Verdi with his beloved dogs (1800s)

    

14. Composer Benjamin Britten and English tenor Peter Pears having a rather sombre picnic (1954)

    

15. Gustav and Alma Mahler taking a stroll nearby their summer residence in Toblach (1909)

    

16. Composer Sally Beamish at her home in Scotland, on a hammock, with a dog (2014)

    

17. Soviet composers Sergei Prokofiev, Dmitri Shostakovich and Aram Khachaturian, just hanging out (date unknown)

    

18. Composer John Philip Sousa among his four-legged “musical friends” (1922)

    

19. Leonard Bernstein at lunch with Aaron Copland at Tanglewood, the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra (1946)

    

20. Pioneering composer Amy Beach posing for a photo with four American female songwriters (1924)

    

21. Claude Debussy, flying a kite with Louis Laloy

    

22. Leonard Bernstein, sitting atop a tree in Israel (date unknown)

    

23. George Gershwin photographed while painting a portrait of Arnold Schoenberg (1936)